Various technologies have recently been developed to link an external terminal (or external device), for example, a smartphone with a vehicle head unit installed in a vehicle.
Currently, an external smart device has been connected to a vehicle head unit through near field communication such as Bluetooth communication, Wi-Fi communication, etc. In addition, some vehicle head units include mobile communication modules, and thus may be linked through a mobile communication network with an external telematics server.
For example, a smartphone manufacturer, Apple, and an Android OS provider, Google, have recently launched CarPlay and Google Android Auto, respectively, corresponding to individual standards. As a result, a user can use a display of a vehicle head unit through a second display of a smartphone by connecting the smartphone, which runs iOS or Android OS, to the vehicle head unit wirelessly or by wire.
In addition, MirrorLink led by the Car Connective Consortium has been gradually extended by several original equipment manufacturers (OEMs). In China, a function of linking a vehicle AVN system and a smartphone, which has been independently standardized by leading information technology (IT) companies such as Baidu, Tencent, etc., has been developed.
A function of linking a smartphone and a vehicle head unit allows various applications of the smartphone to be conveniently used in the vehicle, allows applications suitable for the vehicle to be distributed through the ecosystem previously constructed by Apple/Google/Baidu, etc., and allows the applications to be frequently updated. Thus, it is possible to effectively overcome problems of the absence of the ecosystem, restriction on upgrade and connection, etc. that a conventional vehicle has had. Therefore, the function of linking the vehicle head unit and the smartphone is expected to be a technology that can enhance marketability of the vehicle head unit which can lag behind a conventional IT product.
Moreover, a recently released vehicle and smartphone support a vehicle-dedicated data channel for transmitting and receiving various types of vehicle-related control information and various types of information obtainable from the vehicle, for example, driving information, fuel efficiency information, breakdown information, etc.
Control instructions and data contained in a packet transmitted and received through the vehicle-dedicated data channel include information and control instructions that threaten vehicle security. Thus, when the information is leaked or changed, the leaked or changed information may have a fatal effect on safe driving. Therefore, it is important to detect and prevent hacking into vehicle security data when the smartphone is linked with the vehicle head unit.
More seriously, when code is counterfeited or falsified by a malicious hacker in a process of distributing SW of Apple/Google, etc., code having a potential security risk may be installed in the smartphone, and thus vehicle security risk may increase.
As illustrated in FIG. 1, according to a current technology of linking a smartphone and a vehicle head unit, the smartphone and the vehicle head unit are connected to each other using a physical communication means such as a universal serial bus (USB)/Wi-Fi/Bluetooth/ZigBee, etc., and the vehicle head unit decodes and renders received data such as video or audio to output the data using an included output means when the smartphone transmits the data. In addition, the vehicle head unit may transmit, to the smartphone, input data input through an included input means such as a touch screen, a key button, etc., audio data for voice recognition, handoff, etc., positioning data acquired through a global positioning system (GPS) module included in the vehicle head unit, etc. In addition, the vehicle head unit may establish a vehicle-dedicated data channel with a particular vehicle-dedicated application included in the smartphone to transmit and receive various types of vehicle control information and state information through the established vehicle-dedicated data channel. For example, the vehicle head unit may transmit breakdown information, driving information, fuel efficiency information, etc. collected from various controllers in a vehicle to the smartphone through the vehicle-dedicated data channel, and the smartphone may transmit various control instructions for collection of vehicle information and various control instructions for control of an operation of the vehicle such as emergency braking to the vehicle head unit through the vehicle-dedicated data channel.
In general, a vehicle head unit is used in a physically controlled environment. In addition, the vehicle head unit is not continuously connected to a network, or software and firmware in the vehicle head unit are not constantly updated by a user. Thus, security risk of the vehicle head unit is low when compared to a smartphone.
On the other hand, the smartphone is continuously connected to the network, and thus is continuously exposed to malicious hacking from outside. Thus, software having malicious code may be installed.
When the smartphone is hacked, a hacker may remotely control the smartphone to transmit a control instruction of emergency braking, a random operation of a steering wheel, etc. to a vehicle, thereby causing a serious problem in vehicle security.